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Friday 12th December 2025

Dear Families,

It’s officially open! Our newly refurbished library—named in honour of the inspirational Floella Benjamin—was unveiled in today’s EY/KS1 assembly, led by our Reading Lead, Ms Amy, alongside some of our brilliant Year 1 pupils and parents Laurie, Photini, and Anna.

A huge thank-you to all the volunteers who have generously given their time to support the refurbishment and restocking of the shelves, and to Anna Geldart for her wonderful artistic designs.

What a special part of our school this is. We can’t wait to resume regular library visits in the spring term!

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Well done to Reception and Nursery, who treated us to a touch of Christmas magic on Tuesday. They looked adorable and sounded wonderful—definitely spreading some much-needed winter warmth.

It was also fantastic to see and hear how well our RockSteady bands are progressing. Across Wednesday and Thursday, we enjoyed a series of concerts showcasing the emerging musical talent shining throughout the school.

Next week’s festive fun includes the KS1 production on Tuesday, Christmas dinner on Thursday, and Winter Wonderland crafting and dancing on Friday. Both Thursday and Friday are nominated mufti days—festive jumpers and party clothes very much encouraged!

Schönes Wochenende!

Patrick 

Key messages:

Reminder: school closes at 2pm next Friday. 

If you haven't had enough Christmas cheer, the JKPS choir club will be performing Christmas classics outside school from 4pm this Wednesday, 17th December. All parents who love to sing are invited to join in, there will be words and music available. We'll also be selling a modest amount of mulled wine and mince pies towards the Year 6 graduation fund. Frohe Weihnachten!

Emotion Coaching sessions: parents and carers, staff and pupils have all enjoyed receiving emotional coaching guidance this week from the Southwark's Nest Team - part of Groundwork London’s Wellbeing and Mental Health Service. We talked about how important it is to discuss emotions and part of the discussion focussed on the hand model for the brain, and the concept of 'flipping the lid'. FInd out more about Dan Siegel's model here. Discover more about Emotion Coaching here. 

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Thank you to everyone across our community who helped organise and support last weekend's St Nikolaus Tag Fair, and thank you to all those who came along. It was a lovely event, the food was delicious, the music wonderful and the weather was kind to us. We are definitely well into Festive Season now. 

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Eco School Plans for January 2026

Eco School have had a HUGE impact already. In Autumn we have managed to...

  • Promote Car Free Day

  • Promote Cycle to School Week

  • Celebrate National Tree Week

  • Offer free tea tastings for Fairtrade Fortnight

  • Campaign about Road Safety including a Speed Watch

  • Labelled children's bottles/items at school

Thank you for all your hard work and dedication!

In our Eco School meeting today we started to plan for our new events!

Watch out for...

  1. Southwark Recycling Centre Assembly - we made posters to remind our school Southwark Recycling Centre will be delivering an assembly and workshops on Tuesday 13th January

  2. Southwark Recycling Trip (8 years + for safety!): Some of our Eco Reps and Wellbeing Warriors will be visiting Southwark's Recycling Centre to have a tour and find out more about what happens to our recycling!

  3. RSPB's Big Schools Bird Watch - This will take place in January/February. We wrote letters today to Nadeem Perera requesting he comes to the school to talk about birds...fingers crossed!

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Who is Nadeem Perera?

RSPB Ambassador and co-founder of Flock Together. Nadeem grew up on a council estate in inner-city London to becoming one of the UK’s most recognisable advocates for nature and inclusion.  

What's happening in and around school 

Smell detectives in Year 1 - In Science, Year 1 are focuses on their 5 senses. This week we tested out our sense of smell. We went on a smell walk in the school garden and playground to see what we could smell. We worked in groups and used our nose to detect scents. We thought about how to describe that smell and categorise it. We were surprised that the compost was so smelly but lots of us found the rosemary to smell fresh!

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Year 2 had lots of fun today on their trip to the Natural History Museum. 

What is longer: year 2 standing one behind the other, or a blue whale?

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This afternoon the wellbeing warriors were very lucky and took part in a wonderful session of sound cleansing. Clearing the body of built-up experiences through sound expression and exploration. The session was run by Bel from 'The Listening Voice'. Thank you so much Bel for your time and the wonderful experience!

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Friends' Corner

Thank you everyone who helped at the St Nikolaus Fair and wider festivities. From having a pedder board, to making some waffle batter, to choir wrangling, to a shift on the food and christmas tree stalls. It all helps.

A special thank you to Ioana Mul and Clementine O'Hara who took on the missions of the Gingerbread Workshops and the Class Tea Towels respectively. And a perennial thank you to Shivali for continuing with her now famous and much copied wreath workshops - but none beat the original!
It was a bumper year with fundraising activities, and as we do the final calculations we are getting close to raising £10,000 over the various events. We hope to be able to confirm next week whether we broke through the £10k barrier. Funding like this supports the Floella Benjamin Bibliothek revamp, anti-racism workshops, the Sensory Room, regular support for the productive garden and much more.
Get Involved with the Friends
When parents and carers get involved children do better at school.
If you would like to get more involved or just have an idea, members of the committee are always pleased to have an excuse for a coffee. Please reach out either via whatsapp to Claire Wren (07730-433-519) or the Friends e-mail address. We are particularly looking for people who are interested working up some sporting events.
🎄🌟St Nikolaus and Christmas Wrap Up
✨ Any remaining mugs, christmas decorations, coasters and magnets are with Jodie and Jess - please go and claim them asap
✨ If you participated in the popular marshmallow roasting or Santa's post box (for Royal Mail) on Saturday but couldn't work out how to pay (£1 per stick or £2 per letter to cover the stamp) please donate here: https://www.fojkps.org/donate
✨ Year Group Self-Portrait Tea Towels should be ready for distribution on Monday or Tuesday - post depending. If you missed the deadline please e-mail FoJKPS@gmail.com to be put on the waiting list.
✨ If you haven't claimed your raffle prize please contact FoJKPS@gmail.com

Thank you to Raffle Prize Contributors

A huge thank you and shout out to our school community for the generous donation of prizes for the Nikolaus Raffle including:

Andy Waugh - Sixes Cricket

Anna Pharoah - National Portrait Gallery

Arianna Wills - Eos Dance

Cadu Gomes - Br3wery

Hilary Barrett - Hills Opticians

Holly Inverarity- Reframe Pilates

Ken Mustafa - Ken’s Fish Bar

Liz Curtis - Portrait Artist

As Seen at the St Nikolaus Fair - Woodland Cottage Playhouse

The Playhouse is beautifully produced and printed on industrial grade moisture proof cardboard. It is lightweight and space saving, flat packs away and can be put up and down easily. £79 (excl delivery) - normally retails at £129. Free collection from School possible. Please contact Caroline on whatsapp 07710-058-976 if you would like to order.

Forward Look:

🏂 Date TBD (after Christmas) - Secondhand Ski Clothes Sale

🇩🇪 19-24th January - Shout Out for German Week

🇦🇹 23rd January - Kaffee and Kuchen Pop-up (please be ready to bake cakes)

🪾 25th January - Gardening Day

🌰 8th February - Gardening Day

🌳 28th February - Gardening Day

🌷 22nd March - Bumper Community Gardening Day

Attendance

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School attendance is mandatory for all students of compulsory school age. Whilst we understand that it isn't always possible to reach 100% attendance, we are fully committed to ensuring the highest levels of attendance to ensure we enable every student to meet their potential.  

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Key Dates

Key dates coming up:

KS1 Christmas Production (to the school)              2:30am, Monday 15th December

KS1 Christmas Production (to families)                  9:30am, Tuesday 16th December

Christmas lunch                                                                      Thursday 18th December

Winter Wonderland Morning                                                      Friday 19th December 

Autumn Term ends                                                        2pm Friday 19th December

Spring Term starts                                                                       Tuesday 6th January 

(Monday 5th January is a Staff INSET day)

Year 1 Trip to the Tate Modern                                                    Tuesday 20th January

Eco Council Trip to the Recycling Centre                                   Tuesday 27th January

KS2 African Drumming Workshops                                     Wednesday 11th February

More term dates are on our website, including dates for 2026-27. 

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